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In a west side school which used to be only middle school, had an interesting chat with two students. One said, the teachers are too soft on the kids, let them get away with too much. The other explained, we didn't used to have doors on the classrooms. And kids are used to going in and out as they wish.
I find myself exhausted just with the energy to say, YES, you have to have an ID, NO you can't play cards we have an assignment. Till I find they got the cards from the security guard.
The teacher has the most beautiful set of pastels, and I ask for a sentence, and a picture to illustrate it.
Too much too ask. As someone said to me several weeks ago, don't you understand the objective of having substitutes?
It is astounding to me that NObody actually expects anything useful to happen.
I have to get over this urge to educate, to draw out. I CAN'T get over the bottom line feeling that it is NOT acceptable to treat me like wallpaper.
Over and over, I keep remembering that, this is what they do because I'm the one they GET to treat with this much disrespect-- except for the kid who's different. -- body-insults and code-words.
My new approach today was something like, nothing new under the sun-- I have done so much and seen so much, there is NOTHING you can do to me to hurt my feelings. Seemed to get some recognition.
So I ask the young man of lady, would YOU accept the treatment you're dishing out to me? And what would you think of yourself if you did? SO, what should I do? And how about, what should you do?
Do I expect some sensible, humane response? Yah, some days, when people are not so brutalized they won't see. The scariest thing I sense is this lack of reciprocity, this total lack of recognition--not of someone of high-status or authority, just of another human being. I want to require them all to do mirror-exercises, with ME.
These are the ex-Austin kids, for whom they didn't even provide an alternative, when they closed down their school. It IS different from the north-side school I was at earlier this week, where faculty see themselves as all progressive. I could refer, there, to the poster on the wall which listed the golden rule as voiced in five different religious traditions. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you-- Confucius, and Islam, and Judaism, and Jesus-- and another, Buddhism. No such references, except the wonderful things I see teachers do --a trip to cook at the international youth hostel, for the french class.
But it was a long day. J'en ai ras le bol avec eux.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Monday, May 5, 2008
an earlier introduction to daily life
(First posted on February 28)
vaguely daily blog about teaching in a big public system.
Last week I worked in a school where the sub was required to be IN the gym WITH students, but WITHOUT anything to do. Teacher couldn't be trusted to keep basketballs safe.
So a student, not in the class, came anyway. No way to tell when students would not STAY on number (the way gym teachers take attendance) until attendance was taken.
He lunged at students and at me with a shade-pole (the ones used to open an close windows or shades in a tall room), carried around the fire extinguisher and punded on the bleachers upstairs, precariously close to the ledge above others' heads) refused to tell me who he was. PROBABLY showed me a fake ID. My wallet was empty when I left the class.
Later someone (him? His friend?) sneaked into the boys locker room and stole a cell-phone.
I got into a talk with him about why did I have short hair like a man. My dress that day? Or a squaring of the jaw from stressors. Or what? A school where girls tend to be veiled, FEmale teachers dress more femininely? Who knows. Every new place, a new climate-- and it changes over time.
Strange recalling of days at my last regular ("failing" ) school, when kids dissatisfied with the way things were, would lash out at the weakest link. They're predators, says Judy Dench in 'Notes on a Scandal'. They sense weakness. And they hunt.
Scariest part?
The scariest part of this whole day was, I was disregarded and disrespected all day. I didn't THINK about telling anyone until this student's behavior became an issue for another student -- when a cell-phone was stolen from the locker-room. I didn't think it was big deal, or that I should take any measures, until it was a question of someone else's property. I was told I was responsible, of course, because no students NOT dressing for a class ( who are they? ) are allowed (by me?) in the locker room. Not my loss, my fault.
I want to use a log to keep track of what happens and my reactions. Pretty risky to do it in a public place. I can't help thinking there are hundreds, thousands who live a rather besieged life, bumped, bumped, bumped into less and less viable places, because they were taken out of the first place because it was not making AYP*.
*Adequate Yearly Progress, see No Child Left Behind provisions, and definitions at any state education office site.
vaguely daily blog about teaching in a big public system.
Last week I worked in a school where the sub was required to be IN the gym WITH students, but WITHOUT anything to do. Teacher couldn't be trusted to keep basketballs safe.
So a student, not in the class, came anyway. No way to tell when students would not STAY on number (the way gym teachers take attendance) until attendance was taken.
He lunged at students and at me with a shade-pole (the ones used to open an close windows or shades in a tall room), carried around the fire extinguisher and punded on the bleachers upstairs, precariously close to the ledge above others' heads) refused to tell me who he was. PROBABLY showed me a fake ID. My wallet was empty when I left the class.
Later someone (him? His friend?) sneaked into the boys locker room and stole a cell-phone.
I got into a talk with him about why did I have short hair like a man. My dress that day? Or a squaring of the jaw from stressors. Or what? A school where girls tend to be veiled, FEmale teachers dress more femininely? Who knows. Every new place, a new climate-- and it changes over time.
Strange recalling of days at my last regular ("failing" ) school, when kids dissatisfied with the way things were, would lash out at the weakest link. They're predators, says Judy Dench in 'Notes on a Scandal'. They sense weakness. And they hunt.
Scariest part?
The scariest part of this whole day was, I was disregarded and disrespected all day. I didn't THINK about telling anyone until this student's behavior became an issue for another student -- when a cell-phone was stolen from the locker-room. I didn't think it was big deal, or that I should take any measures, until it was a question of someone else's property. I was told I was responsible, of course, because no students NOT dressing for a class ( who are they? ) are allowed (by me?) in the locker room. Not my loss, my fault.
I want to use a log to keep track of what happens and my reactions. Pretty risky to do it in a public place. I can't help thinking there are hundreds, thousands who live a rather besieged life, bumped, bumped, bumped into less and less viable places, because they were taken out of the first place because it was not making AYP*.
*Adequate Yearly Progress, see No Child Left Behind provisions, and definitions at any state education office site.
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